Thanks all. I took 2 complete days off from training (aside from running a mile and carrying heavy bags one day). But I took two full days off in a row from lifting weights and made a big return today pressing 70lb dumbbells in each hand for shoulder press, doing like 12 sets of t-bar rows, pull-ups, etc.

I spent nearly 5 hours at a Science Center today with Lean and Green and thendanisays. We even brought in our own backpack full of food I drank 2 scoops of Sun Warrior in the car, had 2 protein bars, then Lean and Green busted out a container of tofu he had made and some fruit. We consumed all of it

Then we headed to the gym.

We trained for about an hour exactly and saw forum member Aaron there too (who is super strong and solid at about 190 lbs right now, by the way). I always see forum members at the gym. I also saw an old high school friend I've only seen once in the past 12 years. We were basketball teammates when we were both about 105 pounds and the weakest guys on the freshman team. Things have changed since then and he says he follows me on facebook and wants my book. It was cute.

In the gym I got right down to business on shoulders and back. Like this yo....

40-something total sets in an hour! + like 4 sets of push-ups. I was busy. Lots of drop sets and super sets.

Felt good. Then got my eat on and got my tan on and at the tanning place two people were super inspired by talking to me and want to make changes for health and decided right then that going vegan was the best thing to do. I gave them some free Vega, some literature I had in my car and told them I'd drop off a book for them too. Hope they stick with it.

Home now at Lean and Green's house eating and will make more food so he has some ready to go when he gets back home from dancing.

I go to New Orleans on Monday for a week in LA, AL and MS. Heading down south for a 5-day tour. Excited.

Night night all.

Keeping my journal interesting with photos (I promise more food pics soon...I have like thousands as I document stuff for future books, etc.). Here is one with an author friend of mine Milisser Elliott

PS my book is still rocking Amazon's socks off! It's in like top 10,000 of all literature and top 50 in 2 categories. Pretty crazy!

For exactly 6 months I have trained 5-6 days a week. I've made some solid progress along the way. I didn't gain nearly as much weight as I thought I would during this time but there are reasons for that. I haven't been over-eating, I've been playing basketball, running, using the stair climber, doing other aerobic activity and sit in the low 180's at a time I thought I'd be knocking on the door of 195+.

I'm OK with it. Abs got better than ever before in my life in late 2010, I'm fit and can enjoy running on the beach or on trails, can play basketball which is my favorite sport, and I'm not stuffing myself with food, therefore saving some money and feeling better overall.

I'm actually quite content with an "injury-free" slow approach. I have a tiny somewhat of an injury at the moment but it doesn't slow me down much at all. Aside from that, no injuries, back to squatting, deadlifting and pushing some heavy iron. Today I decline benched 275lbs and felt great about it!

I'll still keep gaining weight, just at a slower pace and it works out well for all the photo shoots I'm doing. I have another one in a few days in New Orleans and more in Miami, LA, likely Vegas, Austin and other places. Getting myself in shape!

I haven't seen all the photos from LA shoots but I have some posted on FB. I'll attach a few here too.

Today at the gym I trained chest for an hour and then climbed the stair stepper for 30 minutes.

I had a massive burrito before the workout but found a restroom and sorted myself out before I hammered chest! Nice!

Starting with flat barbell bench press I did about 6 sets, going up to 205 pounds. Not real heavy, but I was working on higher reps and it felt good. Then for decline barbell bench the weights felt really good so I got up to 275 pounds cleanly for 2 reps, no spot, only a spot on the 3rd rep. The very next set, nearly an hour into the workout, I repped out 10 with 225 pounds with no spotter. I did about 6 sets of decline barbell bench press too. I had long rest periods as I pressed heavy weights like 225 for 10, 250 for 6, 275 for 3, etc.

Then I moved over to incline dumbbell flys super-setted with incline dumbbell press.

Good times.

Moved over to the stair climber and went to town for half an hour.

Now I'm back at Lean and Green's and have created a Worldwide grass roots book promotion team. Anyone want to help out? Just email me your address and I'll ship you postcards to distribute in your town, along with some Vega packets as a thank you from VeganProteins.com

We're rocking! So many packages to ship out! I imagine my Amazon.com rankings will soar over the next few months.

Triceps dumbbell kickbacks x 4 sets followed by sumo squats with dumbbell and or push-ups

Dips x 4 sets followed by sumo squats or push-ups

Lots of overall sets, aerobic workout but still lifted pretty heavy dumbbells for good form and range of motion and it felt good.

I also spent 20 minutes on the stair stepper at a fast speed, so fast that I got a really bad side ache but kept going since I only had 2.5 min left when it kicked in. And I spent 15 minutes on the bike watching the end of the Celtics vs. Magic game. I LOVE the NBA. Makes cardio sooo easy to do since I don't have a TV at home. So fun to watch NBA Basketball!

Now time for bed because I have to wake up in 4 hours to catch a flight to New Orleans.

Super busy next couple of months, booking trips and talks all over North America and beyond. I'll be going to places like New Orleans, Seattle, BC Canada, Los Angeles, Jamaica, Florida, Hawaii, and other places in just the next two months. Likely San Fran, Denver and Nashville tossed in there too. Super, super busy!

My book will make Amazon's Top 100 overall titles by April. They carry 29 million titles and I'm ranked about 10,000 right now. Top 100 coming in 90 days

Hustling!

-RC

Oh, a guy from Montreal sent this to me when he visited Boston. One of my better arm shots, and worse forehead, glasses, hair shots

Fun to finally be back in shape and making improvements. Still a long road ahead and a long way to go, but I'm on that path and on that journey and will keep on fighting!

Today I took a planned rest day. I was up at 4AM after going to bed around 1AM. Lean and Green got up at the same time to take me to the airport. I flew to Denver and met up with a friend from PETA and continued on over to New Orleans. Had lunch, ran a bunch of errands and then headed over to Baton Rouge, LA which is where I am right now, eating then heading to be soon.

This afternoon I got one of the most exciting emails I've received in a long time, and I imagine I'll only get more and more like this as I progress.

A very famous person, someone who is the best in the world at what he does contacted me directly about getting a copy of my book from me. He's seen on TV, is friends with athletes, Presidents, actors, you name it....and has been a role model for me, so it was so crazy that he came right out and approached me about the book. I couldn't be happier! I won't reveal who it is yet, but it is personally very exciting!

Others like Hugh Jackman, Alicia Silverstone etc. have my book but this is one of society's leaders so I'm pumped!

I'm working super hard to get my book to become a Top 100 Best-Seller. I even filmed a video trailer/commercial for the book and more than anything...I'm trying to be in great shape and lead by example. Day in and day out. Even though today was a rest day, I feel like I'm progressing and making some good decisions. More food, then sleep. Night Night!

There will be many mystery people....and many top business people or celebrities already have the book as well as many celebrities or athletes I'm not even aware of who likely have it by now.

I'll try to find a way to share soon, but just want to keep things under wraps a bit for now.

Today I got up and went for a run in Baton Rouge, LA. It was just about 20 minutes or so and then I did a bunch of sets of push-ups. I've got a few hundred push-ups in so far today and I still have more to do.

No gym today, lots of time driving. I would have liked to have been in a gym, of course, but I'm with a group of 5 and we're touring together and just didn't make it to a gym.

Just got into Jackson, Mississippi now and doing push-ups at the hotel before bed.

Today I trained in New Orleans with my friend Debra. We used the hotel gym downtown where we stayed and it had sufficient equipment for my arm workout. While I hit the weights, she did an hour-long session of yoga and then joined me for a bit of cardio and weights while I continued to train with weights. We ended up the gym for nearly 2 hours and it felt good to really hammer my arms hard.

We had amazing food in New Orleans including absolutely outstanding food at an African restaurant for lunch and at a place called Green Goddess for dinner. Amazingly friendly people on staff at both places too. Then we hit Bourbon St. which was only about 1 or 2 blocks from our hotel. My friend Matt who works with Peta walked around with me and we talked motivational stuff for a while until almost 1AM in below freezing temperatures as the crazies and drunks threw beads around and walked into bars filled with live music or naked women. Matt headed to bed and I cruised around a little more and then finally got into bed around 2AM but not asleep until 330AM-ish. I was so pumped from my motivational/personal development talk with Matt I couldn’t even sleep.

Time for rest. I need to get more of it, along with more calories and more heavy weights!

Today I got up early even though I didn’t fall asleep until 330AM and had a long week. I woke up at 7AM and was out of bed a little after 8AM to head to the gym. I worked out for a solid hour training back and shoulders before heading back to the hotel to get some Vega and get ready for another Peta protest. In the hotel gym with limited but sufficient equipment for my creative objectives, I worked out with dumbbells again. It went like this:

After my workout I headed back the hotel room to get cleaned up and check out and do a Peta protest on perhaps the most popular street corner in New Orleans. Lots of photos were taken, I’m sure some will appear online in due time. It was really fun and some local friends came out too which made it extra fun. Shout out to Jehan who came to help not only in New Orleans but also in Baton Rouge a few days ago. Another shout out to Derek who interviewed me for his vegan radio show for the third time in as many years and did a photo shoot with me standing on top of a structure in the city’s busiest street corner making a scene as I took my shirt off and posed. My spray tan from a week ago is wearing off big time and was only one coat so I may look funny in some pics but I’m not too worried about it. I’m just focused on getting back home to eat and eat and eat and get back in a proper gym and get my SWOL on! Boarding a plane from New Orleans to Portland. I call it “home” because I’ve been in Portland for the past two months aside from various trips out of town. I’m choosing a “new home” though as I get back out on the road in six days as I say goodbye to Oregon for a while. I’ll be back to visit a few times in the spring and fall, but my summer will keep me elsewhere. I plan to truly hide out. I may not even mention what city or state I’m in. I want to get down to business and finish my next book without the distraction of a community around me. I just want to go solo for a while, just like I did when I wrote my last book. But until April when I do “settle” somewhere for at least a brief period, I’m going to be touring non-stop and crushing it super hard with my Worldwide Grass Roots Book Promotion Campaign. I really believe it will lead to outstanding levels of success for my book and I greatly look forward to seeing the results of our collective effort. I plan to storm into the Overall Best-Seller list on Amazon.com and it’s going to take one heck of an effort, but I’m up for it. After the exhausting pursuit I will take a break from current book promotion, turning that over to a massive team I’m assembling and I’ll quietly train hard daily and write hard daily. I’m so looking forward to April, May, June, July and August. Then in September, my Vega/book tour starts again. I also greatly look forward to that, but those spring and summer months just might be the most fulfillment I experience all year, on my own doing what I love to do most.

I’m flying back to Portland now. Quick stopover in Vegas, home late tonight where Lean and Green will drag himself to the airport at 11PM to get me, just as he rolled out of bed at 4AM to take me to the airport on Monday. What a great guy. I’m extremely grateful. He’s one of the few people in my entire life who I always know I can count on, no matter what. I can’t really say that about other people, aside from maybe my sister, my mom and possibly one other friend. Respect.

I woke up feeling groggy from the long day flying back from New Orleans the day before and short on sleep in general. When I woke up there was a text message from forum member Jason Morris saying he assumed I was hitting the gym and wanted to see if I wanted to train. We've been meaning to train together for about a year but hadn't, until today. When I saw the text I wasn't even sure I could make it to the gym. I was so out of it.....tired and slow to get going.

Then I went to run errands for Lean and Green since he is sick in bed. I got food, and some other things so he could rest and thendanisays made him soup and prepared foods and drinks for him based on my grocery shopping. While shopping I saw Ironman Magazine which has a wonderful, positive and amazing review of my book on page 44. I heard it was in there but hadn't seen it. There is an image of my book and I have nearly a full page in a popular mainstream magazine. The review is 100 percent positive and encouraging too!

I was so pumped! While at the store I saw Jessifly and she was the first to see.....then thendanisays.

I was so psyched I was ready to rip the gym apart....and I did!

Jason and I met up at the gym in the early afternoon and hammered chest!

After about 10 minutes of warm-up with push-ups, bench press with just the bar, some bodyweight squats to get blood flowing and some light stretching we jumped right into it.

I told Jason I was going to go for something big. I was just too amp'd. I wanted something big. I had decline bench pressed 275 lbs last week and wanted to top that at 300 lbs.

We started with flat bench press. I kept the reps low for this workout by design (aside from the warm-up sets). It went like this:

I was drinking Vega energy drink throughout the workout and Vega Sport Protein immediately after the workout.

I told Jason it was the best workout I've had all year, not just in 2011, but in the past 12 months. I worked so hard to get that 300 lb decline bench. I may have even had one more attempt that wasn't mentioned in my journal. I just kept going back for it, refusing to give in. Jason had already started on incline press and I was still finding ways to get 300 pounds up on decline.

Then we sat in the steam, sauna and hot tub for about 45 minutes.

I ate a bunch of food after the gym, stopped by the store to get Lean and Green some lemon/ginger tea and left it on the counter. He was asleep so I just dropped it off. thendanisays will be there tonight to help him out. I'm staying with my sister to try to avoid catching his current illness. I go to Canada in less than a week so I want to be fresh.

It's exactly midnight now. I'm so excited about my Worldwide Grass Roots Book Promotion Campaign! In fact, I wrote my book publisher tonight promising them that come April 22nd, Earth Day, I'll be the #1 author in the entire publishing house and in the Top 100 of ALL books on Amazon.com.

I'm dedicating the next 90 days to making it happen in late April and beyond!

Pumped!

A little more food then off to bed. Hitting a back workout with Jason tomorrow!

Wow, thanks so much! Love that the library is bringing it in! Thanks for your kind words too. I appreciate it.

As someone who is obsessed with intense work ethic, I would have enjoyed working all day but since I leave in about a week for tour the entire rest of the year, I took 3 hours out of my day to spend time with one of my best friends, his wife and 3 kids. It was really fun.

Then I got down to business and you know I crushed it! I woke up earlier than I would have liked, in order to meet my friends this morning, but I guess it got me off to a good and busy start for the day. Tomorrow I'll be sleeping in a bit. I could use a catch up on rest.

After crushing it with my book I went to the gym. Jason Morris who I trained chest with yesterday for our record-setting workout was supposed to workout with me but he ended up getting busy so I trained back solo.

As I'm writing this I realized I forgot to do Shrugs which I thought about doing toward the end of the workout. I had to pee every 10-15 minutes so I was mentally thrown off a bit. I still worked hard, including a set of 26 pull-ups and bringing deadlifts back in for the first time in about a month, but had to make about 6 restroom breaks during my 1 hour 15 min workout.

Then I had 2 different Vega protein drinks and sat in the sauna for 10 min, showered and ate some fruit and headed down to my favorite burrito place and got two massive burritos!

After that I headed over to Lean and Green's to pick up some things. He's starting to feel better but he's not 100% yet. thendanisays and Lean and Green are directly supporting my Worldwide Grass Roots Book Promotion Campaign so it's pretty awesome.

At my sister's now. Gotta head to bed, sleep in, and then spend Valentine's Day with my mom

I'll get a workout in before I head out of town. Then in Canada in a few days. Life on the road.....

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